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Breakfast Topic: When other players become other people
This Breakfast Topic has been brought to you by Seed, the AOL guest writer program that brings your words to WoW Insider's pages. Since World of Warcraft is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game, we know from the beginning that behind every character name on the screen is another player. However, since all we see of other players is that character, it's often hard to remember that there are real people on the other side. But sometimes, that reality sinks in fast. In my first guild as a brand-new player, I looked up to my guild master as if he were a decorated general and I was a recruit shaking in her boots. In raids, I was amazed at the respect he earned from other players. When I browsed the forums, I found threads in which the opposite faction called him out, requesting duels so they could try their skills against his. He was larger than life. Then late one night in guild chat, it was mentioned that one of our warlocks was named Matt in real life. The guild master happened to be online, and he chipped in, "Oh cool. My name is Matt too." He linked his Myspace and offered to add us. It was as if Toto had pulled aside the Wizard's curtain in Oz. Suddenly, my guild master wasn't just an epic-geared raid leader with a huge reputation and enough skill to back it up ... He was a dude named Matt, slightly balding, with two kids. This scenario repeated itself over and over, as the orcs, trolls, undead, and tauren turned out to be college students, office workers, military personnel, and stay-at-home parents. They were real. Have you ever had a moment when another player "became real" to you? What was it like?
The Daily Grind: Do you socialize differently in-game?
Some people are just naturally more social than others. Some of us have no trouble talking to new people, asking questions, making friends, and generally interacting with our fellow humans. Others struggle to even make eye contact with the cashier at the local McDonald's for fear of somehow screwing things up. But whether or not you're a social person, how you behave often depends on the situation you find yourself in -- such as whether you're in the real world or trying to get four random strangers to attack the darn skull-marked target first. There are those of us who go from being a shy and insular person in the real world to a social butterfly when we get online, and there are those of us who perform the exact opposite transformation and barely say a word. And then there are people who don't change much, who are just as shy or outgoing as they are in day-to-day life despite the change of venues. Do your social traits change when you log in? Or do you tend to stay the same in the virtual world? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of our readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's The Daily Grind!
